During the earlier days of gaming, the most common way of knowing if a game was good came mostly through word of mouth. Sometimes, though, you came across a game no one had played before. Perhaps it was a gift from a relative or the art on the box seemed too irresistible to pass.

During the late 80’s, my father was out on business trips quite often and he would make up for lost time with gifts. One time he came back with Space Harrier for the Sega Master System. I had never heard about it, and the box art looked like a space man performing laser dentistry on a giant snake, so I was not particularly excited.

Turns out the game was excellent! I’ll never know why my father bought it out of all other games. Maybe it was the first one he saw, maybe the clerk at the store recommended it, or maybe it was on sale. Whatever the reason, my sister and I were glad he did.

What game did you randomly acquire and ended up falling in love with?